Two jokes about Mel's speech: One, Two

Losing steam in Cleveland.

What delights will Tuesday bring?

Poor souls trying to get basic food, water, supplies in Columbia.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQ-Y05rOLcw

Just because you have a uterus doesn't mean everything that comes out of it is brilliant:

However, some men (not all men, of course) view the original film as holy writ and don’t want anyone with a uterus anywhere near it. These guys are bad guys, and we — by which I mean women and guys who are not bad guys — should call them out on their badness.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/express/wp/2016/07/15/hes-not-a-loser-just-because-he-hates-the-female-ghostbusters/

As pointed out in yesterday's linkies, the original was lightning in a bottle: the right people, the right director, the right script and in the right proportions made that work. Change any of those properties, and we're not discussing a remake at all.

Huh: the Gene Siskel test.

Is this film more interesting than a documentary of the same actors having lunch?

You may remember, back in May, when Queen Elizabeth complained about the rudeness of Chinese officials toward the British ambassador. One Chinese newspaper responded with:

"The reckless gossip-fiends in the media there, narcissistic and baring their fangs, seemingly retain vestiges of the inelegance of barbarians...But with constant exposure to 5,000 years of continuous Eastern civilization, we believe they will make progress."

After hearing similar complaints from a 50-ish friend of mine (about everyday people, not officials) I got curious and searched around.

"The Ten Characteristics of Chinese Tourists"

(I think the author is British)

http://www.chinauncensored.com/index.php/real-china/615-culture-absence-of-chinese-tourists

Excerpt:

"Westerners used to have an image of China as a country steeped in the Confucian way of life where the principles of propriety, reverence, courtesy, goodness and benevolence were held in high esteem. These, though, are just the qualities that are lacking observing Chinese tourists. What has gone wrong? The problem is that the old China has made way for the new China where everything has been reversed. Since the Cultural Revolution what was once regarded as good is now regarded as bad, and what once regarded as bad is now regarded as good. Chinese tourists only reflect the philosophy of the totalitarian regime under which strict rule they have to live and were brought up in. They are not bad people, but unfortunately they don't know any better. It is time that the new makes way for the old again and Chinese people can return to the values of old that they had to abandon by force."

And, regarding another article: What I don't quite get is why the sign outside the Louvre, warning people not to defecate anywhere other than in the toilets, is only in Mandarin and not also in Cantonese!

Remember, laws are for Republicans:

http://thehill.com/policy/finance/288240-huds-castro-violated-law-against-political-activity-report

"Virginia Needs to Fix Its Racist Voting Law"

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/19/opinion/virginia-needs-to-fix-its-racist-voting-law.html?_r=0

"The Class Politics of Decluttering"

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/18/opinion/the-class-politics-of-decluttering.html

I have my doubts about decluttering being something that only rich people need to do - after all, we live in an age when even poor people don't live without TVs or video games, which eventually become obsolete. Part of one top-rated comment:

"...Why would someone have three carrot peelers? Because they are wealthy, or because they are poor? Correct answer is poor. A carrot peeler at a garage sale might fetch $0.25 or $0.10. The same carrot peeler might cost you anywhere from $8.95 to $17.95 retail. (If you don't believe me, go check Amazon.) So what does a prudent poor person do when they break their carrot peeler or it no longer works? They use the back-up obtained from the garage sale. The wealthy person goes on line and has a new one delivered in 48 hours. Same is true for T-shirts."

Which happens to be the same number of candidates that the Dems are fielding, but that's not relevant is it The Hill?

https://twitter.com/thehill/status/755230939060592640

"Virginia Needs to Fix Its Racist Voting Law"

Actually, they need to fix their racist violation of Second Amendment rights. The current Governor restored their voting rights via executive fiat, but they have to petition the state to regain the right to keep and bear arms.

And they haven't been told they have to make a petition.

In the that's gonna leave a mark category:

Williams has so far acquitted three officers from the original Freddie Gray Six, and he's said primarily the same thing about each case. His verdicts have begun to sound like law school lectures: carefully worded, clear, concise and firm.

Maybe Williams could offer an online course in criminal evidence and the requirements for guilty verdicts.

Maybe Baltimore State's Attorney Marilyn Mosby should sign up for it.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/dan-rodricks-blog/bs-md-rodricks-0718-20160718-column.html

My husband and I went to see Ghostbusters yesterday bc the kid is away and he had the day off. Now, I will be honest, I never thought the orginal was a cinematic tour de force so I do not really get the hand wringing and moaning related to this reboot, but it did color my preception of it going in. After seeing it yesterday, I have to say it was very enjoyable. My husband and I were pleasantly surprised and so were the other people in the theater. I didn't see any overt man bashing, the storyline was tweaked so that it was fresh while still keeping to the original premis of the first film. On balance, it was no better or worse than the original. If you are on the fence about seeing it, I recommend you do. It was worth a few laughs and was not raunchy or bitchy at all.

Sheep Mom, I'm going to see it this weekend.

On another topic, this shit...

http://theweek.com/articles/636879/melania-trumps-unforgivable-sin?utm_source=afternoon&utm_medium=article_1_07_19_16-14_43_35&utm_campaign=newsletter

...is out of control. Plagiarism occurred here, clearly. One or more speech writers is responsible.

But no one "appropriated" the words of a black woman, especially since Michelle Obama's speech was written by Sarah Hurwitz.

It's boiler plate IP. Look up a couple dozen commencement speeches. You will find the exact same lines. They are cliches.

Lazy writing I agree. But I can't get worked up over the one without getting worked up over the other. Michelle (or Sarah) wasn't original either.

There are worser reboots (Total Recall, Robocop) than the Ghostbusters one.

And I firmly believe that the people in charge of the PR of this film should be tarred and feathered, and then flung into the Great Lakes via Trebuchet.

I wouldn't recommend this, personally. Good thing there's this guy, he'll do it and post video:

https://youtu.be/vUvfU_2MaqI

About the plagiarism thing, Joe Biden called and said it's not a big effin' deal.

It looks like Michelle plagiarized the exact same lines from The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Or perhaps from thousands of graduation ceremonies. Does a plagiarism of a plagiarism count? Were not talking about an academic paper here.

Writing doesn't have to be GOOD to be plagiarized. Saying "It's not plagiarism, they're just two tangential figures making similarly vapid and platitudinous statements" is BS.

Show me one commencement speech that's as close to either of those passages as they are to each other.

The construction and sequence are too similar to be a coincidence. Someone copy/pasted those sentences from Michelle Obama's speech as a template and failed to rework them. Regardless of whether valuable intellectual property was stolen (it wasn't), it was obvious, and Melania looked foolish.

But it is NOT "unforgivable cultural appropriation" as claimed by that writer.

On balance, it was no better or worse than the original.
Sheep Mom
_____________________________________

I'm not surprised. Just because some movies endure for more than 30 years doesn't mean they're of great cultural importance - or that we should be struggling to get kids to watch them for another 30 years. In the same vein: While "Gilligan's Island" could be said to be better than a lot of other comedies from the 1960s, 70s, and 80s, it doesn't mean it shouldn't be allowed to die out - if it does. There are better comedy shows and movies to watch - not to mention wittier books to read.

To put it another way, a love of candy doesn't lead to a love of vegetables. Only EATING vegetables does that - eventually. Any large amount of candy is too much, with or without vegetables in the same week.

Why do we argue so much about the type of entertainment that was probably a waste of young people's time to begin with?

Thanks for the review Sheepmom